Ai Weiwei: Likeness

Ai Weiwei is Chinese concept artist. Explore interesting quotes on likeness.
Ai Weiwei: 436   quotes 37   likes

“You’re in total isolation. And you don’t know how long you’re going to be there, but you truly believe they can do anything to you. There’s no way to even question it. You’re not protected by anything. Why am I here? Your mind is very uncertain of time. You become like mad. It’s very hard for anyone. Even for people who have strong beliefs.”

Ai Weiwei

2010-, The City: Beijing, 2011

People , Way , Question , Strong

“I lost all connection with the outside world and was immersed in a world of darkness. I was scared that my existence would fade silently. No one knew where I was, and no one would ever know. I was just like a small soybean—once fallen to the ground, it rolls into a crack in the corner. Being unable to make any sounds, it will forever be forgotten.”

Ai Weiwei

Wong, Veronica, and Gisela Sommer. “ Ai Weiwei Describes Mental Torment in Captivity http://www.theepochtimes.com/n2/china-news/ai-weiwei-describes-mental-torment-in-captivity-59915.html.” Epoch Times, August 3, 2011.
2010-, 2011

World

“[My family] suffer so much. My mother was much older when I came out [of detention]. She had problems with her hearing and high blood pressure. But they still support me. When you make somebody disappear and you don’t announce it to the family, what is this? You make people desperate and bring them close to death. If our cat or dog is lost, it makes us desperately want to know where it is—so for humans disappearing, you can barely imagine the pain. What kind of society is this? If a society cannot even support somebody like me, then people ask: Who is under protection, then? That’s why there is such support for me. It is not because I am so beautiful or so charming. People feel, This guy is fighting for us.”

Ai Weiwei

“ Ai Weiwei: Artistic Licence http://www.economist.com/node/21554178.” Economist, May 5, 2012.
2010-, 2012

Death , Pain , People , Family

“I loved New York—every inch of it. It was a little bit scary at that time, but still, the excitement was so strong—visually and intellectually. It was like a monster.”

Ai Weiwei

2010-, I have to speak for people who are afraid, 2010

Love , Strong , Time

“When I checked into a hospital [in Germany, after having been beaten by police in Sichuan], I was told there was bleeding in my brain and I was near fatal collapse. I was rushed into surgery. When I awoke I felt like a normal person again. But I will not feel whole until I and my fellow Chinese can live freely.”

Ai Weiwei

2000-09, An Artist’s Ordeal. 2009

Feeling , Personality

“Expressing oneself is like a drug. I’m so addicted to it.”

Ai Weiwei

2000-09, The Bold and the Beautiful, 2009

“My messages are temporary and shouldn’t be our permanent condition. And like the wind it will pass. We’ll have another wind coming.”

Ai Weiwei

2000-09, Who Is Ai Weiwei?, 2009

“I am always trying to find how to get the message through. [In Munich] we custom-made five thousand backpacks like the ones of those students [who died in Sichuan] to construct a simple sentence [spoken by the] mother of a dead student. It was: 'She has been happily living in this world for seven years.”

Ai Weiwei

2010-, Ai Weiwei, interview by Christiane Amanpour, 2010

World , Dead

“China might seem quite successful in its controls, but it has only raised the water level. It’s like building a dam: it thinks there is more water so it will build higher. But every drop of water is still in there. It doesn’t understand how to let the pressure out. It builds up a way to maintain control and push the problem to the next generation.”

Ai Weiwei

2010-, China’s Censorship Can Never Defeat the Internet, 2012

Way , Understanding , Problem , Thinking

“Later I became very involved in writing. I really enjoyed that moment of writing. People would pass around my sentences. That was a feeling I never had before. It was like a bullet out of the gun.”

Ai Weiwei

2010-, Ai Weiwei: The Dissident, 2011

People , Feeling

“During my detention, they kept asking me: Ai Weiwei, what is the reason you have become like this today? My answer is: First, I refuse to forget. My parents, my family, their whole generation and my generation all paid a great deal in the struggle for freedom of speech. Many people died just because of one sentence or even one word. Somebody has to take responsibility for that.”

Ai Weiwei

2010-, Ai Weiwei: ‘Shame on Me.’, 2011

People , Family , Parent , Freedom

“Measuring national prestige by gold medals is like using Viagra to judge the potency of a man.”

Ai Weiwei

“ Gold Is Not the Real Measure of a Nation http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2008/aug/25/olympics2008.china,” Guardian, August 25, 2008.
2000-09, 2008

“But the internet is like a tree that is growing. The people will always have the last word – even if someone has a very weak, quiet voice.”

Ai Weiwei

2010-, China’s Censorship Can Never Defeat the Internet, 2012

People , Tree

“The worst thing about Beijing is that you can never trust the judicial system. Without trust, you cannot identify anything; it’s like a sandstorm. You don’t see yourself as part of the city—there are no places that you relate to, that you love to go. You have no memory of any material, texture, shape. Everything is constantly changing, according to somebody else’s will, somebody else’s power.”

Ai Weiwei

2010-, The City: Beijing, 2011

Love , Memory , Change , Parting

“"It became like a symbolic thing, to be “an artist.” After Duchamp, I realized that being an artist is more about a lifestyle and attitude than producing some product."”

Ai Weiwei

Karen Smith et al. Ai Weiwei (Contemporary Artists (Phaidon), London: Phaidon Press, 2009.
2000-09, 2009

“There were thousands of moving messages. People sent money from their first month’s salary. Others said: This is my retirement payment—take it. This is the money for my next pair of shoes—take it. It was very important for me to see and hear those things. Normally you do not see the warmth, humor, care and generosity of the people while writing a blog. You just feel like you are walking in a dark tunnel and you feel alone.”

Ai Weiwei

2010-, Ai Weiwei: ‘Shame on Me.’, 2011

Money , People , Shoe , Feeling

“Contemporary art and the [Communist] Party are an impossible situation. It’s like oil and water—they can never mix.”

Ai Weiwei

2000-09, Truth to Power, 2008

Art , Water

“The most unfair things that could have happened in a society fell upon a blind man. This is something that no one can accept or explain away with any excuse. Everyone will ask: 'Do we actually have to exist in a society like this?”

Ai Weiwei

2010-, Ai Weiwei Says Blind Dissident’s Escape Will Inspire Chinese, 2012

“There is no revolution like the Communist revolution. You simply burn all the books, kill all of the thinking people and use the poor proletariat to create a very simple benchmark to gauge social change.”

Ai Weiwei

2000-09, Truth to Power, 2008

People , Books , Thinking , Gauge

“The Sichuan disaster is not the first nor the most wrongful. But all the details of this tragedy will be forgotten, and once again it will be like nothing ever happened. Eventually all these disasters will together create a bizarre miracle called civilization and evolution.”

Ai Weiwei

2000-09, Our Duty Is to Remember Sichuan, 2009